Saturday, October 5, 2013

Saturday, January 7, 2012

How often we think we have everything under control and God, in His mercy, continues to redirect and mold our life. He redirects in a way that is really answer to prayer, but not how one is expecting.

That would be life at our house this week.

We took Joy-Bug to public school in order to enroll her. See this post for background. She was tested and came out below average for second grade. You need to know she has been in third grade this year. I knew she had learning issues, but this was somewhat confirming and somewhat saddening. The principle wanted her to be in second grade. But, after his explaining all the third grade pressure that would be on Joy-Bug next year (as in not passing a test would make her have to retake third grade), we knew we needed to regroup. We can not have her two years behind her peers.

So, we came back and called the local Christian school. You'll remember that we really liked it, but felt it would be too challenging for Joy-Bug. Well, they met with us and put her in second grade- ADHD, anxiety and all. She has two teachers and only SIX students in that class. There is also pull-out tutoring for her to get her up to snuff. And, to top it off, they gave me a coupon for half off tuition this spring! So, God is obviously in that! Joy-Bug brought her first folder home last night and had FIVE WORKSHEETS COMPLETED. Dan and I cried tears of joy!

In the meantime, we were still not happy with the plan or lack of plan, for Kae-Kae and her completion of eighth grade and impending high school in eight months. We have prayed diligently for three weeks and in the middle of the night, God gave us the answer. We enrolled her in Morning Star Academy- an online school. This means she will graduate from their school and be able to circumvent the state requirements for where we live. They have a non-college track which just means she has to have Algebra I and Geometry, and NO FOREIGN LANGUAGE. Kae-Kae tested and was below grade level on everything. Even though this program is online, I know it is going to take me sitting knee-to-knee with her, which means we have to have a plan for my other two children.

Sooooo, we put them in Christian school, too. About two weeks before Christmas break, Gracie-Girl stopped touching paper. Yep! That is right. Which means, she will not cut, paste, color, handwrite, etc. This is just too much for me to manage- child number three as special needs. So, even though she was in homeschool as a first grader, she also tested low and will begin Kindergarten on Monday.

So, now that the fruit basket is turned over, I have a 7th, 2nd and Kindergartener. Little Guy is the only one on grade level, which is K4. We are also paying private school tuition for FOUR children. And, I am only kind of a homeschooler- I will be helping Kae-Kae all day. Little Guy will only be going to school for 2 days a week, but you can't really homeschool a four year old. We will just play soccer and wiffle ball!

So, I am hanging up my hat as Homeschooling Heather for a while. Maybe to return at another time, or ready for whatever new adventure the Lord brings, as Kae-Kae gets to where she can do more and more of her own school-work during the next six years.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Yes, Kingdom Arrows is still alive and not so well. But, we are here and I am making an update. You will see in this post why we have dropped off the face of the blogosphere.

AnxietyBoth Kae-Kae, almost 14 and Joy-Bug, 8 yo, have been fighting this fall with their anxiety. Many times the anxiety has won out, but we have persevered. Kae-Kae has made an A-plus at her 2 day a week school, in spite of her increased anxiety. But, it has been at the expense of everything else in her life- chores, music, friends, sleep, etc. So, we are planning on making the step of reducing her class sehcuelde to 2 days a month. This allows her to return to weekly counseling, ramp up Math and Science to the 8th grade level and have some rest. She will be stopping piano/composing and may be beginning the flute choir- if we can work through the panic attacks she has when she practices the flute! Hopefully increasing her meds last week and counseling will also help with that.

Joy-Bug had about 2 pretty good weeks this entire fall. By pretty good, I mean she was able to do her 4 subjects with serious modifications. Like, spelling five words out loud while she walked in a circle, playing violin for 5 minutes, doing math for 10 minutes and reading a 2 paragraph story and answering 5 reading comprehension questions. The rest of the fall has been a marathon of never ending whining, crying, and computer games for her.

But, overall, she has not done anything this fall but advance to second level Green Belt in Taekwondo. And, we are SO HAPPY for Taekwondo! Joy-Bug is at the max of her anxiety meds she can take. She can not continue in such a compromised state and our family can not take the pressure and stress she puts on us.

Which leads me to the other 'A' Topics.

ADHD and ADD.

Yep- our new psychiatrist feels that Joy-bug has ADHD. Wow! I am so glad someone could figure out a gigantic piece of our puzzle. She answered YES to every single ADHD question (oh, so did Dan and I). I could write pages of specifically how this plays out in Joy-Bug, but I am sure you don't want all the sordid details. But, this leads me to our gigantic ANNOUNCEMENT.

Joy-Bug will be beginning public school in January.

Whew- I said it! I know many of my readers will not believe that God could lead a Christian family to public school, but He is leading us to put Joy-Bug in. We always thought if she went to school, it would be the Christian school, but they use mostly homeschool curriculum that she can not do and keep up with. It is so small that she would struggle with being in two grades together, always feeling behind the fourth graders. Since it so small, it is more individualized like homeschooling, which she is NOT doing well with. After increasing her meds as much as possible and being in weekly counseling all fall, and doing modifications at home, we can not take her any farther. We need to broaden our team that is helping Joy-Bug to health and wellness. The psychiatrist, counselor and us are not enough, so we are now including school for a semester to see what happens. Oh, and for the record, I have been very pleased with all my interactions with our public school. They have not despised me for having homeschooled and have been very supportive.

Now, we have learned that Kae-Kae has ADD. I kept telling all of the therapists when she was in third grade that she had ADD, but they wanted to label her with all sort of other problems- CAPD, SID, VT, etc. The big puzzle piece seems to be ADD, and that may have led to the anxiety and mental breakdown! Kae-Kae's additional counseling this spring will be helping her develop more ADD coping mechanisms and helping her with her panic attacks- which she thought was asthma all fall. She answered over 90% of the ADD questions as a yes and is very excited to know that there is something somewhat fixable for her. I could list a mile of issues about how this shows up, but the most consistently obvious is the fact that she can not remember to do one thing for longer than one minute. Literally. Like every night and morning we tell her to immediately go brush her teeth, and she immediately forgets- every time. And she will be 14 in a month. She does not even notice when she goes FOUR days without brushing. This is not normal. And the 1-2 hours to do 15 math problems EVERY DAY. I could go on....

Anyway, that is what has been happening here. Joy-Bug has taken every free brain cell that Dan and I have. That is why we have that deer in the headlights look ALL THE TIME.

But, God has been faithfully helping us navigate in His time and with His provision. We made it to Christmas. We made it to the end of year 2 of the worst years of our lives. He is still God and we are still His children.

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Welcome to Kingdom Arrows and the October bird list for our family. This is a meme I have been hosting for a year.

As you can tell, I have stopped posting very often, however I am honored to be nominated for Best Nature Blog. I actually had to have someone email me and tell me that, I am not being a good blog reader right now either! I do feel like all my nature ideas have come from Barb at the Handbook of Nature Study, so I would REALLY suggest you vote for her. She is my nature hero!

Please feel free to keep up with your own list and you can linky here. Normally I post the last day of the month, but chaos has reigned freely around here the last few months.

Friday, October 14, 2011

Anyway, I am motivated to post since Homeschool Dawn and fam are on their way to our house for Fall Break! And, they are coming even though the Sandhill Cranes have not come for the winter. What great friends they are. Of course, being that we are here at the "Scenic City," there are plenty of other tourist things to do.